Tuesday 17 January 2012

Winter is coming.

Hello, T'interwebs!
To continue with my reading theme, I bring you my thoughts on A Game of Thrones, which I devoured like an enormous black forest gateaux with eton mess on the side. To whit - ravenously and with relish.

I feel the need to add a disclaimer - I have not seen the Sky series. I WANT to see the Sky series though. My only knowledge of it was that the illustrious Sean Bean was in it, so I spent a lot of time trying to guess which character he was and putting his head on different people. This made the whole reading process very incestuous ad most people of the right kind of age had the same face which - considering the lineages in this series - was not entirely inappropriate.

For years I've steered clear from any high fantasy beyond Terry Pratchett and the occasional teenage magician saga for fear of becoming a whole new level of geek. But I capitulated this Christmas and, having heard some good things about the Song of Ice and Fire series, I decided to give it a whirl.

Anyway, enough waffle. Let's talk story.

Family Stark are the oh-so-serious lords of the north, whose leader, Eddard, helped put the current king on the throne. However, when the King asks him to come help out with southern political machinations, his family is torn apart because he's just not devious enough. His heir is left behind to protect the keep, another is sent north to guard the frontier between civilised lands and the supernatural border, his daughters join him to learn the ways of the court and his wife sets off on her own mission of revenge. War happens. It's awesome.

You may have noticed, I rather loved this book. The scope of the storyline is absolutely vast and the world in which it's set minutely realised. The shifting perspectives every chapter means I get to see the war from (almost) every side - I love the fact that I've ended up caring about certain baddies even when I'm rooting for the goodies.

The lore is immersive - I want to know what the warrior princess Nymeria did that impressed Eddard's youngest daughter so much. There are rumours and remnants of long-gone elves and dragons, and at least three fully realised religions/cultures, with other bits on the side.

In short, I loved it. I wish they hadn't killed certain characters off, and both sorry and excited that the next book should delve deeper into the supernatural (I liked the sense of mystery), but I finished it on the train into work today, and you can be damned sure that I'll be buying the next instalment on the way home.

Three other books on my 'need to read' list
  • You can't read this book, Nick Cohen
  • Room, Emily Donohue
  • Lord of Chaos, Robert Jordan
End.

Sunday 1 January 2012

2012 book list

I read a lot. A lot. Mostly trash though. Joined a book group last year to up the class of book I read, time to start recording my thoughts on them

Book devourer


Books I'm currently reading/waiting to read:

A Game of Thrones - Loving it
Gone with the Wind - Not impressed so far.
Lord of Chaos

Ironically, none of these are classy at all. Gone with the Wind is awful, Scarlett O'Hara is just a horrible imaginary human being.

Books of note in 2011:

The Help - excellent

The Poison Tree -  Highly recommended.
When God was a Rabbit - Not bad at all
How to be a woman, Caitlin Moran - Highly recommended
We Need to talk about Kevin - Excellent
Girl With the Dragon Tattoo series - pretty cool
Dark Matter - spooooky
A whole bunch of Terry Pratchett, particularly:
Snuff - not bad, not amazing
I Shall Wear Midnight - great story, perfect end to the heroine's story arc

So that was 2012

Everyone appears to be doing their roundups of the year - I'm not usually one for a bandwagon but hey. Might help me actually put my resolutions into action...

2011's been a weird year. The over-riding feeling I have moving into 2012 is "good riddance" and I think that's mainly because of work which has, to be honest, been a bit pants for the majority of the last year. It's a real shame that work is such a large part of my life, because outside of that there have been a lot of really great days, weekends, moments.

It's stating the obvious to say that nobody enjoys a redundancy process and my work has been no different. Fortunately I do still have a job. Unfortunately the process has made most of this year no fun at all. However, the last two months have seen some big improvements and I'm remembering that one of the best things about it is how engaging and challenging it can be, underlining the absolute importance of a decent line manager. My new manager has been refreshingly honest with me about my work and actually made me want to apply myself again.

Onto the funtimes
It's always hard to choose the best moments among so many. I'm incredibly fortunate to have an amazing social circle, which has grown considerably this year Plenty of opportunities for dressing up, which as I've said before is amazing fun, yay!
Going to an 80s party as Cyndi Lauper with Adz as Brian Blessed in Flash and Tris as a glam rocker


I've already mentioned the yearly reunion with fellow meat-and-metal lovers, Gattysburg. This year's Burg was particularly carnage filled, with cars in ditches, foxhunts and ping pong galore. There were some great excursions into Devon - spent a few days hostelling with Adam, then went caravanning for a weekend with his brother and a few friends where we ran into the sea at three in the morning.
Adz and I in Salcombe, Torbay
I also had a lot of fun rediscovering my love for Gilbert and Sullivan when I joined the Grosvenor Light Opera Society, playing a small part in The Gondoliers this summer. It's there I met and got to know my good friend Hazel, who joined us at Sonisphere festival - the best I've been to in my ten years going to these things.
Doing my hair in the dressing rooms

Playing Inez in the Gondoliers
Fellow Dethonator-WAG Lyndsey's hen-do in Sheffield was awesome - I have very few female friends so when I do have a girly night I do enjoy it. Dressing up was fun. And of course the wedding was also a lot of fun.

Hen do! Pirates!
Oh and this year has been a year of celebrity sightings! The SO's brother met John Schaffer and the SO himself met Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson, who lived up to his reputation for being a bit of a knob. And, of vital importance, Dethonator supported Kerrang darlings Glamour of the Kill.

My resolutions
We're not aiming high here, just trying to fix the things that are broken.

  1. Lose some goddamned weight. Goal is to lose at least a stone. 
  2. Keep the house in better order by establishing a workable cleaning routine. Want to start this one with a big ol' house-purge
  3. Improve my work ethic. I need to start thinking about a promotion or a change. Figure the best way to make a start on that is to focus on improving where I am already.
  4. Remember how good my life is and db more cheerful. It's a new year, new opportunities await. time to stop being a pessimist. 
Lets see how that goes...